WHO Rates Its COVID-19 Efforts, Points to $900M Funding Gap

The World Health Organization director-general told the agency’s executive board Friday it has a $900 million gap in funds for its response to the coronavirus pandemic.

In its first virtual meeting, the board and its newly-elected chairman, Indian Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, heard Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus say the WHO had worked “day and night” to coordinate a global response to the pandemic.

Tedros said the WHO published its first comprehensive package of guidance on COVID-19 on January 10, and said it has since issued “almost 100 technical documents.”

He said the organization has held more than 50 news briefings and worked with multiple high-tech platforms, including Facebook, Google and Instagram, to fight what he called the “info-demic” of misinformation about the coronavirus that has spread throughout the world.

Since February, he said the WHO has convened more than 400 researchers worldwide to “identify research priorities,” and that they are tracking more than 700 clinical trials globally.

Also during the virtual meeting, executive board chairman Vardhan led a standing ovation for all the “frontline workers” who have risked their lives during the pandemic. Along with doctors, nurses and other health care professionals, he included sanitation workers, journalists and security personnel of all types.